Agni. The functional-medicine gut protocol.
One of eight Focuses · available on Pause, Reset, and View · £600 – £1,200 indicative
A structured gut-health protocol built on top of the now-standard GI-MAP microbiome analysis. Adds Organic Acid Testing, SIBO breath testing where indicated, a supervised three-day kitchari monodiet inside the stay, the full 5R functional-medicine supplementation programme, an introduction to the Sandhana ferment programme, and a written eight-to-twelve-week take-home dietary protocol. Led jointly by the HCPC dietitian and Dr Prasanna Kerur, who reads the Ayurvedic angle on agni — the digestive fire that Ayurveda has treated as foundational for two millennia and that functional medicine has arrived at from the other end.
The full gut-health read, plus the in-stay reset.
- Dietitian intake consultation — ninety minutes on day one or two with the HCPC dietitian. Symptom history, food-and-mood diary review, current supplement audit, and the shape of the twelve-week protocol.
- Organic Acid Test (OAT) — urine metabolomics covering yeast and bacterial overgrowth markers, mitochondrial function, neurotransmitter metabolites, and vitamin/nutrient functional status. The single most information-dense marker set for gut-brain-metabolic function.
- SIBO breath test where indicated — lactulose or glucose breath test screening for small intestinal bacterial overgrowth. Not run on every Agni guest; the dietitian and Dr Prasanna Kerur decide from the intake picture. Cost included whether or not it's run.
- Three-day supervised kitchari monodiet — the classical Ayurvedic gut-reset practice, kept clinically appropriate by the dietitian. Kitchari (rice and mung dal, spiced) as the sole intake for three days mid-stay. Prepared by the main Ahara kitchen and served to the guest in the restaurant or in-room as they prefer — this is therapeutic food, not a cooking class, so no dedicated teaching-kitchen space is needed. Guests continue to attend Ahara and other spaces but eat the kitchari where they would normally eat the longevity menu.
- Full 5R functional-medicine supplementation programme — Remove, Replace, Reinoculate, Repair, Rebalance. A twelve-week supplement schedule (bottles provided at departure) targeting the specific findings from GI-MAP and OAT.
- Sandhana ferment programme introduction — one hands-on session in the Sandhana kitchen with the Fermentation Lead. Guests take home starter cultures for kefir, kraut, and a house miso.
- Dr Prasanna Kerur Ayurvedic input on Agni — thirty-minute review of the western findings through the classical Ayurvedic agni lens (digestive fire, ama, srotas), with the recommendations woven into the take-home protocol so the two frameworks speak to each other rather than past each other.
- Written eight-to-twelve-week dietary protocol — specific to the deficiencies, overgrowths, and food sensitivities surfaced by the panels. Includes a re-test recommendation at week twelve.
GI-MAP microbiome analysis is a standard inclusion on the Long Reset spine and above. Agni Focus adds the deeper functional layer on top — Organic Acid Test, SIBO where indicated, and the supervised in-stay reset. On Pause (where GI-MAP is not spine-standard), the Focus adds GI-MAP too, at the extra pass-through cost noted in the cost card.
Where each part of the £900 actually goes.
The Agni Focus is priced at £900 recommended (indicative range £600 – £1,200). Inside that fee, £250 flows through to Medilab as the indicative pass-through cost of the Organic Acid Test and SIBO breath test (cost carried whether or not SIBO is clinically indicated). The remaining £650 stays with the hotel and funds the clinical work — the dietitian's intake and daily monitoring, Dr Prasanna Kerur's Ayurvedic review, the kitchari monodiet materials, the twelve-week supplementation programme, the Sandhana ferment session, and the written take-home protocol. After costing hotel delivery at £320 (clinician time at Programmes-page baseline rates — dietitian £55/hr, Dr Kerur £65/hr), the net contribution to new investment is £330 per Focus — a 51% margin on the net-to-hotel residual.
Only Medilab is a true third-party pass-through. The dietitian, Dr Prasanna Kerur, and the Fermentation Lead are all hotel-employed (see the Sama Clinic workforce table); their time is costed at approximate loaded per-session cost. The 5R supplement bottles are procured wholesale and marked into the Focus fee at cost so guests get twelve weeks of continuation without a retail-supplement upsell at departure.
What price does each margin imply?
Costs are fixed: £250 of pass-through to Medilab, plus £320 of hotel delivery (clinician time at Programmes-page baseline rates + materials). The only thing that changes with a different target margin is the Focus fee. Drag the slider.
Recommended: £900 — sits mid-range and positions Agni as accessible against standalone functional-medicine practice (a private dietitian intake is £150+, GI-MAP £350 retail, OAT £250 retail, twelve-week supplement bill £200+). The slider lets you test alternatives.
Session-by-session, per programme tier.
The core protocol is identical across the three programmes it's available on — same panels, same three-day kitchari monodiet, same 5R supplementation, same take-home protocol. What differs is when the kitchari lands in the stay (mid-stay for Reset and View so refeeding completes before departure; earlier on Pause given the shorter runway) and the depth of the follow-up conversation with the dietitian before departure.
| Session / touchpoint | Pause (5 nights) | Reset (7 nights) | View (14 nights) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dietitian intake consultationsymptom history, food diary review, supplement audit, protocol shape | Day 1 | Day 1 | Day 2 |
| OAT + SIBO breath test collectedMedilab-analysed; results back 7-14 days after collection | Day 1 | Day 1 | Day 2 |
| Dr Prasanna Kerur Ayurvedic Agni reviewdosha, ama, srotas — Ayurvedic frame woven into the take-home | Day 2 | Day 2 | Day 3 |
| Kitchari monodiet Day 1 (start)from Ahara main kitchen; guest continues attending the restaurant + spaces | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 5 |
| Kitchari monodiet Days 2 & 3dietitian daily check-in throughout | Days 3-4 | Days 4-5 | Days 6-7 |
| Sandhana ferment programme introductionhands-on session in Sandhana; take-home starter cultures (kefir, kraut, house miso) | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 8 |
| Mid-stay progress reviewonly on View; dietitian + Dr Prasanna Kerur joint check on 5R response | — | — | Day 10 |
| Prescription review + written 8-12 week protocoldietitian; 5R supplement bottles provided at departure | Day 5 | Day 7 | Day 14 |
| Post-stay panel-results reviewphone / video call once OAT + SIBO results are back; take-home revised if needed | ~2 weeks post | ~2 weeks post | ~2 weeks post |
| Kitchari days on-site · take-home protocol depth | 3 days · 8-week plan | 3 days · 10-week plan | 3 days + mid-stay review · 12-week plan |
The £900 Focus fee is held flat across tiers — the panel work and the kitchari materials are the same regardless. View adds a mid-stay progress review and a deeper take-home write-up, funded from the higher clinician time already carried on the View base fee. The post-stay call happens once Medilab returns the OAT and SIBO results (typically 7-14 days after collection) — the guest doesn't leave the loop when they leave the property.
What the £900 buys, priced against private-market equivalents.
Assembling the same functional-medicine gut protocol privately usually means a nutritional-therapist package plus separately-ordered lab tests plus supplements at retail. The comparison below is the a-la-carte cost of the same components outside the Focus.
| Component | Private a-la-carte cost | In the £900 Agni Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Private HCPC dietitian intake (90 min)London / online private-clinic rates for a specialist gut / functional dietitian | £150 – £250 | ✓ included |
| Organic Acid Test (OAT)Great Plains / Genova / Regenerus at direct-to-consumer retail | £280 – £350 | ✓ included |
| SIBO breath test (lactulose or glucose)Aerodiagnostics / commonlabs / private-clinic breath testing | £150 – £250 | ✓ included (whether or not clinically run) |
| Ayurvedic physician consultation (30 min)private BAMS / Ayurvedic physician consultation, UK rates | £80 – £150 | ✓ included |
| 3-day supervised kitchari monodietnot commonly available a-la-carte; approximated as retreat / clinic day-rate | £120 – £200 | ✓ included (Ahara main kitchen) |
| Hands-on fermentation session + take-home starter culturespublic ferment class at SCOOP-style local operators | £50 – £100 | ✓ included |
| 12-week 5R supplementation programme (retail)Pure Encapsulations / Nutri Advanced / Metagenics retail from a private nutritionist | £200 – £400 | ✓ included (bottles at departure) |
| Written 8-12 week dietary protocol drafted from real panelsfollow-up-plan drafting typically billed £150-£300 by private practitioners | £150 – £300 | ✓ included |
| Total a-la-carte value | £1,180 – £2,000 | £900 |
The £900 Focus lands materially inside the a-la-carte low case — before you count the integration value of one clinical team reading OAT + SIBO + Ayurvedic dosha framework together and driving the supplement + kitchari + take-home from that single read. Assembling this privately involves at least three separate providers who don't talk to each other; Agni delivers it as one integrated conversation. The dietitian ownership is the load-bearing operational asset the private-market a-la-carte cannot easily match.
Who Agni isn't for.
- Active severe inflammatory bowel disease (ulcerative colitis or Crohn's in flare) — needs specialist gastroenterology care, not a wellness Focus. The dietitian will refer to the guest's usual clinical team and defer the Focus until the disease is quiescent.
- Recent GI surgery (within six months) — the kitchari monodiet and 5R supplementation both need surgical clearance. Defer.
- Eating-disorder history — a supervised monodiet can be triggering. Skip the kitchari component and deliver the rest of the Focus, or defer entirely, based on the intake conversation.
- Currently on antibiotics or within four weeks of a course — GI-MAP and OAT results are distorted for weeks post-antibiotic. Defer the panels until the four-week window has passed.
- Pregnancy or breastfeeding — several elements of the 5R supplementation (particularly antimicrobials in the R-Remove phase) are contraindicated. Deferred until the postpartum window.